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Sunday, August 16, 2009

Wow what a week! It's been a busy one for me, to the point where I've barely had a chance to work on many new prints but I have done a few! You can catch them in my Etsy store. I'm still listing them as the day goes on :)

I am approaching the end of all that needs to be talked about regarding marketing your Etsy store. At least what I have covered with my own journey. This however isn't the final article. I may be able to squeeze a few more in over the weeks, but I thought it'd be good to announce now that I'm nearing the end! That doesn't hail the end of Coffee and Cake though, as there is a lot that I want to talk about over the weeks that could be of interest, maybe even educational! Gotta get the practice in, I'm supposed to be schooling my son in a few years! LOL! I promise that it'll be interesting, pretty random and definitely worth reading :D Anyway, onward with Part 4 of the Networking Series :) This is an easy one...

Networking Part 4 : Blogging This is an easy one, at least if you like to go on and on and on the way I like to, pretty much about anything! LOL! No, on a serious note blogging is a fantastic way to promote yourself and whatever it is you do to the masses, and pretty enjoyable if you can really make it personal to you. And by that I don't mean literally!. Personal as in, who you are.

Like mine for example, I'm pretty nutty, I love color (VIBRANT color), and I am happy to be myself when I write, yet at the same time I have a real desire to take what I do seriously when it involves sellers of the Etsy community because I believe in paying it forward. You can quite easily be formal and have personality in your blog without it boring the life out of people. That's all you need to write a good blog. BE YOURSELF. If it means you are going to link your blog to a business then that is most definitely the biggest thing you can do, or at least it is in my opinion as nowadays people can feel a little intimidated by formalities. But then again it is important to try not and keep things too casual otherwise you might not be taken seriously at all! Balance is the key, so when deciding what to write about, you need to be able to enjoy what you are doing and have a genuine interest in it. Think about how you want to appear to the world. If you reckon you'd be entertained/helped/informed by your own post, then more than likely others will too.

Don't just make it about your business! It's important to keep it consistant, but the last thing you need is a monotonous blog, so always updating about the same old same old is going to be a big turn off for people. Talk about great things that happen in your life. We all need positive things to read about! Especially as we have enough doom and gloom bombarding our awareness on a daily basis. Great blogs are a breath of fresh air when it comes to reading about things going on in the world. So having something grand to share now and then will be extremely positive in terms of traffic for you. Mine aren't always about positive things but I like to laugh at myself and I always hope it comes across in my entries. Sounds weird but even when I'm moody I know I can use that as an entertaining factor. My eye twitch (which is gone now THANKFULLY) is a prime example of something bad turned good :)

More importantly than things going on in your life, talk about other people and the interesting things you find out about. Make it into a feature! Features are a great thing for people to look forward to regularly. As you know I have this one, and also Monday Magic, and Friday Finds. They're not only different each time I do them and regular, but they are of service to other people. I do them because I enjoy helping people out as well as being able to talk about what I know and love. Your audience will definitely be more inclined to follow you if you show that you have an interest in them, and not just an interest in them being interested in your posts! I'd say that if you can't show an interest in the people giving their time for your posts, then it's not worth blogging. You wouldn't treat friends like that.

There isn't much more I can share with this other than if you do blog, just remember to post it to blog rings, link to it on social networks, tweet it, however you can share it, make sure you make people aware of it :) Don't forget to link back to your blog too with any other thing you may be part of on the web! That's what those side columns are good for! Blogs are your own personal space to be creative, express yourself and to entertain. There isn't anything special to it. I'd recommend learning some basic HTML, or looking into finding cool skins to give it a splash of you :) You don't need to be a literary genius either, just have initiative, GENUINE interest in your readers, and BE YOURSELF!